


Without You: Mars

by BardofHeartDive



Series: Without You [4]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Colonist (Mass Effect), F/M, Grief/Mourning, Headcanon, Loss, Lost Love, Mass Effect 3 spoilers, Tale of Woe, War Hero (Mass Effect)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-18
Updated: 2015-12-21
Packaged: 2018-05-07 09:24:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5451632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BardofHeartDive/pseuds/BardofHeartDive
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Divergent point: Kaidan is killed by Eva Core.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The previous installment in this series is giving me quite a bit of trouble. I will return to it but I had some inspiration for this one and decided to post it instead of sitting on it on principle. I hope a break will give me a much needed new perspective for the Suicide Mission.

Kaidan had been afraid just a moment ago but now he was having a hard time remembering why. He had also been in pain, or at least he thought he had, but it seemed to have passed now. The vaguely star-shaped shadow on his face-plate was puzzling but less and less concerning as moments passed.

His head fell back against something that clanged like metal but that didn’t make sense because it was the trunk of a giant redwood. That oddity slipped away from him as he slid down until he rested comfortably at its roots, looking out into an endless forest of ancient, towering trees. Light filtered through the needles and branches above him creating a dappled pattern on the ground. For some reason it occurred to him that there was a storm was coming but the cool, damp air was perfectly still.

A young girl in a white dress darted out from behind one of the trees. She laughed soundlessly, her cheeks flushed as she danced and twirled in front of him. More than once, she lost her balance and fell but it only made her laugh harder. Eventually she settled down and picked a bouquet of ferns from the bases of the trees. When she offered them to him he saw that one of her eyes was golden brown, the other silver gray. Her mouth moved like she was trying to say something but she didn’t make a sound.

He tried to answer her anyway but his voice was as silent as hers. He sat up, reaching to take the ferns, but his body was suddenly heavy.

The back of his head hit the trunk again.


	2. Chapter 2

Liara and James had been with Mara when she left the Normandy but she’d lost them sometime soon after. She didn’t remember much after hearing that Kaidan was being taken to Huerta Memorial Hospital, just rushing past Bailey and flashes of barreling through the Citadel to reach her destination. Her focus was so intense that she didn’t even recognize the doctor standing in front of her until she spoke.

“Commander.”

“Dr. Chakwas.” Mara tried to slide past her on the right but the doctor moved too, blocking her path. “I’m here to see Kaidan. He got hurt on Mars.”

“I heard about Major Alenko.” She tried going left this time by Chakwas stopped her again. “That’s why I’m here as well. I need to discuss his condition with you.”

“After I see him,” Shepard insisted.

She pushed forward again. This time Chakwas stopped her with a hand on either shoulder. “Now, Commander.”

Chakwas’ “doctor-face,” as Joker called it, could silence a krogan faster than a headbutt. It was a stern mix of expectation, patience, and challenge that could have convinced a Reaper to sit still for its physical. Shepard expected that expression when she finally looked at the doctor but what she found was even worse. Chakwas’ face was soft, even to the point of tender.

“The trauma to Kaidan’s head caused his brain to swell within his skull. They took him into surgery to try to relieve the pressure but it was too severe. His implant was also damaged, which complicated the matter.”

Shepard took a staggering step backward.

“They did everything they could but he’s completely unresponsive. He was put on a ventilator when they took him to the OR but in his condition they’d never be able to wean him.

“The major’s wishes were clear. He did not want to be kept alive by artificial means.”

She knew that. After the Worthington in 83 there had been a number of discussions about it in the mess. Many of the Alliance crew had updated their advanced directives. She had witnessed a number of them, including Alenko’s.

“As a professional courtesy, Dr. Michel is allowing me to withdraw life support.” Chakwas closed the distance between them with a meaningful look behind her eyes. “As a kindness to a dear friend, I elected to wait until his commanding officer arrived.”

Mara swallowed hard but her voice was even when she asked, “Can I see him?”

“Of course, Commander.”

* * *

Mara had seen corpses before. On the battlefield, at funerals, she’d even been called to the morgue to identify one once. She’d visited wounded soldiers in the hospital as well, mostly on acute care and rehab floors but a few in ICUs. Neither of those experiences prepared her for what she saw when Chakwas walked her into Kaidan’s room. Because he didn’t look like a corpse or a wounded soldier to her. He just looked like Kaidan. Despite the tube down his throat and the lines running from his arms, the wires connected to sensors all over his body and the mask of bruises covering his face, he was still Kaidan.

She froze at the door.

“It’s alright, Shepard,” Chakwas said. Then she nodded to the nurse standing by one of the monitors. The nurse pressed a button and the screen went blank.

They worked quietly and deliberately, moving around each other like dancers in a ballet. One by one the IVs came out, the patches were removed, the machines were taken away. By the time the ventilator was the only thing left, Mara was standing by the bed. Tentatively, she slipped her hand into his.

“It’s time, Commander.”

“Okay,” she said, though the whole situation was anything but. “How long will it take?”

“Not long,” Chakwas answered. With deft hands, she slid the tube from his throat. “We’ll give you two some privacy. Take as long as you need.”

An hour later Chakwas glanced discreetly into the room through the window. Shepard was curled up at Kaidan’s side with her face buried in the crook of his neck. Her eyes were dry.

* * *

Liara’s first reaction when Shepard missed the meeting with the Council had been irritation. Besides that having a Spectre present would have strengthened her case for the device, she was not fond of the human councilor. When a member of his own species was present he tended to ignore the others but, without Shepard there, she had received all of his attention. She had always assumed that Shepard was exaggerating when she called Udina a pain in the ass. She saw now that it had been a great understatement.

When her initial annoyance passed, however, she had quickly become concerned. It wasn’t like Shepard to miss something so important, no matter how aggravating. She called Huerta only to be told by the receptionist that the first human Spectre had been there earlier and left a few hours ago. By hacking into cameras around the Citadel, she was able to track the commander from the hospital back to the Normandy. She appeared unharmed but her posture and stride told Liara something was wrong. After finishing with the turian councilor, she hurried back to the Normandy to find her friend.

EDI directed her to the AI core, which surprised her, so she went straight to the medbay. The door between the rooms was closed and she stopped outside it, trying to figure out what she would say once inside. As she was about to knock a voice sounded on the other side.

“Kaidan! Let him go!”

She tried the door and found it unlocked. Shepard was sitting on the floor with an open bottle of Peruvian whiskey at her side. Piled in front of her were the remains of Eva Core’s mechanical body. It had been taken apart with very little care for the pieces. The decapitated head in her hands was playing an audio file, the source of the voice.

“Orders?” Dr. Eva’s voice asked, followed by the Illusive Man’s answer, “Dispose of him.” Liara could hear Shepard yelling “no” in the background but it was mostly covered by two metallic clangs and then gunfire. Shepard’s hands glowed blue as she tore the face from the rest of the head and smashed the larger piece into the floor. It collapsed under the force of the first blow but she slammed it down three more times before tossing it aside.

She picked up the bottle and took a drink before saying, “Kaidan’s dead.”

“Shepard, I’m so sorry. Are you alright?”

“He was everything I was fighting to protect.”

She lifted the bottle to her lips then offered it to Liara. When the asari didn’t accept, she shrugged and used her free hand to pull another piece toward her, one of the legs. She let it float a few inches above her hand before engulfing it in blue flames. She twisted her wrist and the metal screamed as she stretched it, warped it, then curled it around itself. Once she was satisfied, she sent it flying across the room.

“And now he’s gone.”

She took another drink, a long one that made Liara wish she had taken the bottle when she offered it, if only to keep it out of the commander’s reach. When she finally swallowed there was another flare and the fingers of one of the hands snapped apart at every joint. Then she fused them back together into a lumpy gray mass.

“Shepard, Kaidan sent me a message after seeing you on Horizon - ”

“Please, Liara, I don’t need a reminder of the other times I failed him.”

“Just listen for a moment. I had asked for his help retrieving your body before. In his letter he said he was glad he turned me down.” The remains of the now fingerless hand exploded. “He said if he had been there he never would have let me give you to Cerberus. And then he never would have seen you again.”

“Maybe that would have been better.”

“He had his doubts but he never thought that,” Liara said. “You can’t change what happened. You can only choose what you’re going to do moving forward.”

“The same thing I’d do if he were here,” Shepard said. “Spend the rest of my life proving I’m still the person he loved.”


	3. Chapter 3

Shepard knew somewhere deep in her gut that what the Illusive Man was saying was wrong. Just like Saren, he had tried to subvert the Reapers and in the end become subverted himself. He believed it, of course - that was the way of indoctrination - but all his talk about control was nothing more than propaganda. She knew but trying to make sense of the words whispering through her head was confusing everything.

And, regardless of what she knew or didn’t, she was still pointing a gun at Anderson.

“Bullshit,” the admiral said. She couldn’t decide who he was trying to convince. “We destroy them or they destroy us.”

_“ . . . killhim . . . ”_

Amidst the unintelligible hissing, she caught something that sounded almost like words. She grasped at them and they slipped away from her. The more she strained to understand them the deeper they wormed into her mind.

_“. . . killhimshoothim . . . doitpullthetriggerendhim . . . ”_

“And waste this opportunity? Never.”

“You’re playing with things you don’t understand,” she grit out. “With powers you shouldn’t be able to use.”

“I . . . don’t believe that,” the Illusive Man said. He circled behind her then toward Anderson. “If we can control it, why shouldn’t it be ours?”

_“ . . . shoothimfinishhimpullthetriggerkillhim . . . ”_

“Because . . . we’re not ready.”

“No. This is the way humanity must evolve.”

_“ . . . endhimdoitshoothimshoothimpullthetriggerkillhimdisposeofhim . . . ”_

The last words jolted Shepard’s chest like a rappelling rope snapping taut. Her body reacted before she fully understood, years of training and experience drilled into her muscles, so everyone in the room was equally surprised when the bright red stain appeared on the Illusive Man’s white shirt. There was a moment of perfect stillness while her mind caught up, then she fell to her knees sobbing Kaidan’s name. Eventually the wails subsided to whimpering gasps but they only stopped when Anderson’s hand found her shoulder.

“Let it go, child.”

He helped her up but she collapsed again. He caught her before she hit the floor and his hand came away wet and red. He pulled off the charred remains of her armor to find a shotgun wound on her side. The surrounding undersuit was soaked with blood.

“Damnit.” He tore off one of his sleeves and pressed it into the wound. She came semiconscious at the pain and he ordered, “Don’t you die on me now, marine!”

“Sir. No, sir.” Her eyes fluttered closed and open again. “I’m cold.”

He stripped off his vest to cover her as his radio crackled to life.

“Shepard,” Hackett’s voice said. She stirred at her name, but Anderson gently pressed her down. “Commander!”

“This is Anderson. Shepard’s wounded. We need a medical team.”

“Anderson.” The other admiral was surprised but he didn’t pause. “Nothing’s happening. The Crucible’s not firing. It’s got to be something on your end.”

“I’ll take a look,” Anderson answered, leaving Shepard to return to the the console. “Now, send in that medical team!”

Before Hackett could respond a white light appeared and the floor he was standing on lifted toward the ceiling.

* * *

The ceremony was small and simple. There were no flowers, or gifts, or decorations. The reception dinner was assigned rations without cake or champagne and all the music was played from an omni-tool. Kahlee’s gown was a soft yellow sundress and Anderson managed to find a set of dress blues only slightly too large. The wedding lacked any extravagance but it was still the most beautiful Mara had attended. Watching Mr. and Mrs. Anderson dance their first dance as husband and wife, she could believe everything from hunting Saren to building the Crucible had been worth it.

Well, almost everything.

The song ended and the happy couple gave each other a long, deep kiss, starting another round of cheers and applause from the guests. Holding his wife with one arm, Anderson waved them off with the other. It only encouraged them. When they did pull apart Kahlee went to the table where the wedding party was seated. She reached toward Hendel, her man of honor, and pulled him to the area cleared for dancing. Anderson was approaching Mara.

“Shepard?” he asked, offering her his hand.

“Anderson, of all the stories told about me, the only one that wasn’t exaggerated is my inability to dance.”

“Come on, Shepard. You’re going to deny me a dance on my wedding day? After all we’ve been through?”

She couldn’t argue with that so she reluctantly let him help her to her feet. They found a place on the floor. Kahlee smiled at her as Anderson placed one of her hands on his shoulder.

“And don’t worry,” he said. “Mitra can’t dance either, so we picked something easy. Just rock a little. You’ll be fine.”

“I’d feel safer patrolling the Terminus, sir.”

It looked bad at first. They started going opposite directions with Mara badly off rhythm. They struggled with each other, more like wrestling than dancing, and she lost her balance. She teetered, banging their shins together and stepping on one of his feet as she caught herself. After that, she kept both feet on the floor, swaying only her upper body. Anderson took to mirroring her, slowing her down to only slightly ahead of the beat, and they fell into a stable, if awkward pattern.

“You know, Shepard, I didn’t expect to see the end of the war. When things were bad I’d think of Kahlee, imagine the life I wanted her to have after it was over. I fought for her future but I never dreamed I’d get to share it with her.”

“I’m happy for you,” Mara said. “You deserve it, more than anyone.”

“We both know the exception to that,” he answered. She started to dismiss the statement but he shook his head, cutting her off. “But never mind that. The point is I wanted her to have that future even if I couldn’t share it with her.”

“And what if she wasn’t the one who survived?”

Mara knew it was wrong. This was the wedding day he never thought he’d have and it shouldn’t be tarnished with thoughts like that but the words spilled out before she could stop them. Anderson seemed to anticipate them though because he didn’t pause or flinch.

“Then I would have tried to live the life she imagined for me. Just think about it. Consider it my wedding gift.”

“I thought this dance was your wedding gift.”

“I hardly call this dancing. Honestly, I should have worn a hardsuit.”

“Well, I warned you.” They rocked back and forth a few more times before she added, almost shyly, “I don’t know what he wanted for me.”

Anderson chuckled and pulled her close enough to whisper in her ear, “What every good man wants for the person he loves.” He kissed her cheek, a quick peck like her father used to give her for luck. “Happiness.”

She didn’t answer right away. In fact, for what remained of the song she closed her eyes and pretended she was the newlywed in the dance. But when the bride came to retrieve her husband, Mara gave his hand a quiet squeeze and said, “I’ll think about it.”


End file.
